The subject matter herein relates generally to electrical connectors, and more particularly, to back plane connectors.
With the ongoing trend toward smaller, faster, and higher performance electrical components such as processors used in computers, routers, switches, etc., it has become increasingly important for the electrical interfaces along the electrical paths to also operate at higher frequencies and at higher densities with increased throughput. For example, performance demands for video, voice and data drive input and output speeds of connectors within such systems to increasingly faster levels.
In a traditional approach for interconnecting circuit boards, one circuit board serves as a back plane and the other as a daughter board. The back plane typically has a connector, commonly referred to as a header, which includes a plurality of signal contacts which connect to conductive traces on the back plane. The daughter board connector, commonly referred to as a receptacle, also includes a plurality of contacts. Typically, the receptacle is a right angle connector that interconnects the back plane with the daughter board so that signals can be routed therebetween. The right angle connector typically includes a mating face that receives the plurality of signal pins from the header on the back plane, and contacts on a mounting face that connect to the daughter board.
At least some right angle connectors include a plurality of contact modules that are received in a housing. The contact modules typically include a lead frame encased in a dielectric body. The lead frame includes a plurality of conductors that interconnect electrical contacts held on a mating end of the contact module with corresponding contacts held on a mounting end of the contact module. However, known connectors have problems operating at the higher performance levels of current systems. For example, known backplane connectors have limits to high speed electrical performance in the areas such as crosstalk, noise persistence, footprint impedance, and skew.
A need remains for a connector that overcomes at least some of the existing connector limitations to meet more demanding performance requirements in a cost effective and reliable manner.